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Tuesday, November 25, 2014

The Queanbeyan Swap Meet is held in conjunction with two car shows - the Ford, GM, Chrysler Day and the American Car Day. This post is mainly about the Holden's that were on display on the Saturday. I will post about GM cars that appeared on the Sunday, in the near future. The focus of this post is mainly on Aussie GM cars.

Sunday, November 23, 2014

The Queanbeyan Swap Meet is held in conjunction with two car shows - the Ford, GM, Chrysler Day and the American Car Day. This post is about the Ford's that were on display on the Saturday. I will post about Ford cars that appeared on the Sunday, in the near future. The focus of this post is Aussie and English fords (OK, a few US cars as well).

Interesting profiles. Only the front panels and floorpan are interchangeable between the sedan and coupe. Even the windscreen glass is different.

Saturday, November 22, 2014

The Queanbeyan Swap Meet is a Canberra car show fixture, and now it has been moved so it doesn't clash with the AFL Grand Final, it is increasing in size - more vendors and more buyers. They hold it in conjunction with two car shows - on the Saturday a Ford, GM and Chrysler show and on the Sunday an American Car Show. This post is all about the crap that people cart to the Swap Meet to sell, with only a few car photos. They are coming in separate posts.

The last of a series of posts from the German Autofest 2014. Mercedes Benz was by far the largest marque represented, maybe just slightly more Mercs than Volkswagens. There was a strong mix of modern and historic vehicles, although the nature of time and the way people relate to their cars, always favours modern cars over antique vehicles in volume. It is pretty obvious that the two door Mercedes tend to live longer than their four door brethren. Zero station wagens on display also.

A most intriguing car. The most highly modified Mercedes I have ever seen I would like to know more about this car.

Sunday, November 16, 2014

The NSU Ro80 is an iconic car. The first commercially available rotary engined car made, well before Mazda, it was sadly not a sales success. It is powered by a 995cc rotary engine driving the front wheels. The Wankel design was not robust enough for everyday driving and mechanical failures blighted the cars reputation. This was the last design built by NSU from 1967 to 1977.

Sunday, October 12, 2014

Bathurst 1000 is an annual event, with months of preparation. It therefore came as a surprise when on lap 60, officials stopped the race for 45 minutes to effect repairs. True to Australian workplace conditions, there were 6 guys watching 2 guys doing the work (it's not like it needs to be done quickly). Note that there is even a guy leaning on a shovel!

This being Bathurst (where in a previous year, a kangaroo jumped into one of the cars racing), other whimsical incidents of note included the light bar on the medical car flying off at about 120km and a spectator punting a white football onto the track.

It was inspired thinking to hold the 2014 German Autofest on the Patrick White Lawns (between the National Library of Australia and Lake Burley Griffin). It meant that people attending the car display, could also watch an Amphicar drive to the lake, enter the water, do a lap or two from bridge to bridge, and then drive out - switching from car to boat to car - and impressing us all.

How the Amphicar works

The Amphicar is a fascinating piece of engineering, and has been on my 'must see' list for as long as I can remember. Designed by an engineer that worked on the German Schwimmwagen program during WW2, the interesting amphibian used an 1147cc Triumph engine to power itself on land and water. The 43 HP engine provided a top speed of 7 knots in the water and 110 km/h on land. First appearing in 1961 production ceased in 1965, with around 4000 made.

Canberra Times photo of the Amphicar driving out of the lake

The car in this article was imported in non-running condition by a Cooma based collector. It was bought at auction at a lower than expected price, as according to the owner, they are very difficult to repair and source parts for. He looked at it when it finally arrived in Australia and discovered that the polarity of the electric's had been

Monday, October 6, 2014

Yes I am an idiot who realises in that 'ohnosecond' (the time between realising you have made an error, and the error occurring) that I have locked the keys in my 1974 Leyland P76 Super V8. The ohnosecond occurring as the car door slams shut and I see the keys in the ignition, instead of my pocket.

How to get them out? After looking at various methods, I decided to use a plastic coated coat hanger and bent it into this shape so I could latch onto the interior door lock and jiggle it up. A complete success. I figured that a wire coat hanger might scratch the paint, so I went with a slightly thicker plastic coated wire hanger. It took about ten minutes and I was closely observed by the postman, several people walking dogs, people driving past etc.

Thursday, October 2, 2014

I recently visited Newstead in Central Victoria. While walking around, I noticed this very nice 32 Ford roadster. I wandered over and saw a few people in the front yard of the house it was parked in front of. It turned out that these two cars are owned by Ryan Ford, who is incredibly busy running Chopped this weekend. On the way up the Hume I saw dozens of rods and customs heading the other direction. I will definitely go in 2015.

The BMW area had a few bikes as well as cars. I prefer the BMW coupes to the sedans, I think BMW just get it right. This unusual motorcycle towing a motorcycle also caught my eye, and was very popular with people all day.

Thursday, September 25, 2014

Part two of several posts from the German Autofest. I do not know why I took so few photos of Porsches. Maybe because they are just so common? I really like the Panamera and it reminds me of the 928 in many ways (except the Panamera has 4 doors). Enjoy!

What do you do when you have a car that you developed for an Army contract, that you didn't win? You look at selling it to the public. That's what Ford Australia did in the late 1960's. using the Australian designed and built Ford Falcon, mating its six cylinder engine to Jeep 4WD mechanicals, and offering it to the public.

Unfortunately, the development time on the XY Falcon Ute 4WD and importing some parts such as the special order front axles, took so long that the XA ute was being sold as it was coming to market. In fact it also carries XA parts, such as steering columns.

As the only Australian designed and built 4WD until the Holden Adventra, it was a groundbreaking car, that should have been the start of bigger things - but sadly died almost stillborn. Only 432 were built. That makes them rarer than a Phase 3 (of which there are more today than when built...).

On Sunday September 20, on a glorious Canberra spring day, i went to the Patrick White lawns between the national Library of Australia and Lake Burley Griffin, to look at a few hundred German cars owned by Canberran's.

Over the next week or two I will post quite a few great shots of stunning german cars. Today I start with Volkswagens!

This morning I set out on my way to the German Autofest (report coming soon) and as I was driving through Kingston, an old FIAT caught my eye. I pulled into the carpark in Telopea Way, and saw three old FIAT's. The FIAT owners were deep into conversation, so I couldn't ask them why they had three FIAT's in a carpark, on a Sunday morning. Still, here they are for us all to enjoy.

They are a 1968, a 1948 and a 1914 (yeah, that's right 100 years old) trio.

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About Me

"An on the go guy whose desire for adventure knows no boundaries. he's a jet setter who makes the action, then moves on before the crowd arrives."
Management Consultant, Public Transport Activist, Motoring Enthusiast, Reader, Writer, Thinker, Agitator...
If you want to contact me, you can email me at dchaas67 at gmail dot com